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zzambrosius_02
For a few minutes, it seemed to Ambros that the whole world became a continuous explosion. The communicator in his helmet spoke quietly in Megálos’ voice: “Stay down, soldier girls and boys, turn on your beacons if you’re hit. This is bad shit going down...”
Ambros had to agree: “I’m supposed to be helping the Red Warrior Guild get out of Bangui, since they got trapped...”
A bomb went off and Ambros yelled: “Way too damn close, Commander!”
“Endaxi...I got a read on position and I sent...”
Megálos’ voice faded out and Ambros’ “radio” gave him only static. He looked at his visor and saw a set of coordinates: ‘I don’t know if that’s the location of the artillery or not...’
He shrugged and spoke aloud: ”I really don’t wanna stay here, though.”
More explosions, all around his position: ‘Is this random, or am I bracketed?’
He sent the coordinates to his Shifter by a flick of his eyes.
Another shell landed about twenty feet to the west of him: “Oh, fuck...”
The shell didn’t go off: ‘A dud...’
He got out his plasma sword and activated it, wondering how much power the thing had left. He commanded the Jump.
***SALTATION***
He began to laugh as soon as he was there. He used his APS to cut through the barrel of the nearest gun in the line, and the huge iron tube fell to the ground with a crash and rolled toward him. He Saltated a few ells to one side, out of the cannon barrel’s path, and slashed at another. The barrel didn’t come off, but it sagged significantly. He laughed even harder: “I don’t actually have to cut them through...”
He sliced through the loading mechanism of the next piece, and then saw a couple more Hellenes drop in. They immediately joined in, destroying the big guns.
The three of them ran, Jumped and fought their way down the line of cannons. Some of the men servicing the guns fired rifles at the Hellenes, half-heartedly, as though they knew their bullets would do no damage; most of them took one look at the Hellenes and ran towards the distant treeline. Several of the guns exploded for one reason or another: ‘Plasma interacting with explosives, shells impacting blocked barrels, whatever...’ The last few riflemen finally ran off.
‘I can’t even imagine what we look like to those militia...’ He felt a swell of bitter amusement filling his belly and laughed hysterically as he slashed at the weapons.
Soon the bombardment came to an end: ‘The cannons are all out of action and the soldiers working them have fled...and I don’t think we had to kill anybody, so that’s a bonus.’
The other two Warriors jogged in his direction.
“Anybody know what’s going on?” he yelled, as soon as they were in earshot.
“Not the faintest idea,” said the first person to reach him.
His visor showed him her name and rank as she approached: Magistri Dijani Skjoplena, Serbian Red Warrior Guild, Prime Commonwealth Line.
“Magistri,” he nodded: ‘No one is gonna be saluting in combat.’
“I have no radio,” said the other soldier, ID’d as Spathos Marcos Parnassinos: “No maps either. Drones are not responding.”
Ambros chortled: “Negative magnetic anomaly. I bet the Timeline distortion we’re causing by merely being here is making that damn thing fluctuate.”
“Enough to mess with quantum entanglement? In a seven dimensional field?” The Magistri seemed indignant at the possibility.
Ambros laughed, a real belly laugh, free of the hysteria he’d recently felt. He restrained himself and said: “On the evidence, yes. We really gotta get out of this Line, we’re only making things worse by our presence.” He shook his head, muttering: “Not like that hasn’t happened in various Africas, throughout history. I knew this was a dumb idea...”
“What are you doing here, then?” asked the Red Warrior Spathos, surprised.
Ambros snorted: “Favor for a friend, Spathos. Just that. And ifthis plan had worked, we’d have saved a lot of lives...”
“Let’s get back to the bombardment zone, look for casualties,” said the Magistri.
“Yeah, I guess we better.” Ambros swapped out the power module in his Sword and checked coordinates: “Ready.”
***SALTATION***
Ambros roamed the acres of shell craters and body parts, gagging at the smell and mourning the dead: ‘All these men, most of them so young...the cannonade hit across the front line, so the idiots killed as many of their own as they did of their enemies.’ He knew that was not unusual in the history of warfare, in any Line: ‘They must have got bad coordinates from their forward spotters...if they had any.’
He found a shell hole with three Red Warrior Spathae spread out on the ground around it. He remembered what he’d said to Regulos, not that long before: ‘Commonwealth armor is not proof against a big enough bang...shrapnel can’t kill you, but the concussion can.’
He placed locators on each Spathe’s armor, and signaled for their pickup. He stepped back: ‘Nothing...that really shows how screwed up this operation is...’
He waited a while. His ‘radio’ hissed in his ear, then: “Spathos Ambros?”
“Akuo sas.”
“You have an evac?”
“Yes, Magistri Ke’akani. Can you manage it?”
More static, followed by: “Maybe, one at a time. In the intervals when I have a good connection...”
One of the three vanished with a bang.
“No big hurry,” he said: “They are dead.”
“So I see...sorry, Spathos.”
“Yeah, thanks. I think you oughtta use SB Controller privilege and start pulling all of us out of this cluster-fuck. We’re making things worse. I bet...”
“I’ll take that under advisement. This is Gennasi’s operation, we’re all volunteers...I can pull youout...”
“I got that, but I don’t want to abandon my comrades here...’
Another body vanished.
“Akuo sas. Half the force is out already. Gennasi wants to do one more push to separate the warring sides. Last report...” More static.
“Say again, Magistri?”
“...said she’d got the sides separated in Line Five...she’s in Seven now, and she and Megálos are...static...hear me?”
“Can you Saltate the three of us to Gennasi’s location?” Ambros waved a hand to summon the other two dispersed soldiers to him.
They jogged over, having heard at least part of the conversation.
The third body disappeared.
“Hold a moment...all right, stand close!”
**SALTATION**
The ground shook and men screamed. Gennasi and Megálos lay prone along a drainage ditch, firing their rifles westward. Two little kids lay in the ditch below them, cringing, as more explosions lit up the evening sky.
Ambros and his companions fell to the ground alongside the others and began to fire in the same direction.
Men in motley uniforms of several nations’ militias alternately charged their position and fled screaming, only to charge again.
Ambros’ helm screen went blank. He could hear Gennasi yelling some kind of orders, but he coud not make out what she wanted. Spathos Marcos seemed to get her drift; he rolled down to the kids, wrapped them close in his arms and Jumped.
Gennasi summoned Ambros with a wave. He crawled over.
More Hellenes dropped into the ditch and began firing at the chaos in front of them.
Gennasi hollered: “These men are coerced! There are machine gun crews slaughtering them if they try to retreat! Shoot at their feet, or over their heads! Pass it on!”
Ambros reached Gennasi’s position. He rolled to the front of the ditch and started shooting at the ground ahead of the attackers. Between waves he asked: “Can’t we take out the machine guns?”
“Dhulyenumei,” said Megálos.
“Ke’akani is moving every Hellene she can find to this position!” Gennasi yelled: “She’s going to get the Main Controller to pull us all out at once!”
“Sounds good to me! But there’s a lot of interference! I’m not sure she can do it!”
He turned to look at the field and saw a man’s head explode as machine-gun bullets strafed the reluctant attackers from behind. Blood and brains from that victim splattered his visor, then slid slowly down the frictionless surface and onto his scale.
Several of the attacking soldiers cast their weapons aside, raised their hands, and dove into the ditch with the Hellenes. They cowered as Gennasi turned to look at them. She shook her head, then said in French: “Stay there! We will see to your evacuation and re-settlement!” She handsigned to a Spathisi, who turned her gun to cover the refugees.
The machine guns suddenly fell silent.
“Got ’em!” Megálos cried
More Hellenes appeared, and then yet more; Between Hellenes and refugees, the ditch filled rapidly.
Ambros helm ‘radio’ still alternated static and silence; “Be ready,” he muttered to himself: “We may not get a warning...”
***SALTATION***
He dropped in prone, in another part of the jungle; puzzled, he looked around.
His MPS pinged him; it was Ke’akani on a Commonwealth ‘phone’ line: ‘That alone tells me how messed up our communications are,’ Ambros thought.
“Spathos Ambros,” she said.
“Present,” he replied, still looking around.
“Can you fly a Commonwealth troop transport? You are listed as rated ‘minimally competent’ on fighters...”
“Never flew a bigger Commonwealth aircraft.”
“Well, it’s you or nobody. We have about 200 Red Warriors, mostly Skolarae, stuck in downtown Bangui. Too much static from that magnetic anomaly for me to pull them out. I have the troop transport about two hundred ells east of your current position, but nobody nearby to fly it.”
Ambros didn’t bother to ask why it was him or nobody: ‘Ke’akani must have her reasons for that.’
“Give me coordinates on my destination, and I’ll give it a try,” he said, already walking eastward.
He found the thing, and staggered a bit at its size: ‘That thing is as long as a DC10...and much more spacious.’
The hatch opened when he touched it; he climbed onto the wing, then into the cockpit.
Once he got settled into the seat and powered the machine up, he saw that the controls were indeed very similar to the fighter aircraft he’d learned on. There were seats for four more crew in the cockpit. He realized he didn’t need the backup: ‘I basically just have to think about where I want it to go...or look at a target to aim. And I’m not likely to have to fight, or Shift...’
He saw the coordinates and waited for the force fields to squeeze him. The holographic control panel winked on and the fuselage disappeared from his sight. He raised the monster a few ells off the ground and began to feel the controls.
He carefully didn’t shrug; he took the thing up to about 300 feet and powered up the weapons panel.
He flew slowly, knowing that even if the controls were the same, the sheer mass of the machine would make maneuvering a lot trickier.
He saw the city of Bangui in the distance. ‘Smoke and fire, and explosions,’ he thought: ‘This whole country is out of control.’
Small arms fire hit the transport; his holo controls told him there hadn’t been any damage. The machine wallowed a bit as he turned toward his coordinates. He leaned left a little more, so as to pass over the Warriors he meant to pick up. He hoped they’d see him and respond.
His helm gave him static with occasional words. The transport’s communication system got him contact with a Spathisi on the ground: “Can you set down with the hatch pointed north, three hundred twenty ells south of my position?” she inquired: “There’s a park there large enough for you to touch the ground.”
“Akuo sas,” he said: “Tha symmfromei...”
He settled where she’d asked for him: “Spathisi: I’m down. I can see your path of retreat. My weapons are active; I’ll cover you.”
He willed the hatch open, then watched alertly as the Reds retreated.
“By squads,” he heard the Spathisi say: “Cover and move, NOW!”
He grounded the machine again, outside the free fire zone near where Gennasi and Megálos still held position. The Reds he had aboard ran out when he opened the hatch, forming a perimeter.
‘It’s nice when people know what to do and just do it,’ he thought.
Soon a mix of refugees and Hellenes could be seen, retreating along a riverbank to his right.
He used a loud-hailer “Everybody get aboard! Ke’akani wants to Saltate this ship right into a cargo bay!”
He could hear them loading, moving refugees along, securing the hatch. Occasionally struggles broke out, as refugees resisted entering the behemoth.
He lifted the transport up a couple feet and waited, listening to Ke’akani’s laconic commentary on Shifting various troops: ‘The more of us leave the Line, the less static I hear on my communicator...’
Then: “Ready, Spathos? On my mark...Mark!”
***SALTATION***
The transport sat on the floor in a cargo bay; Ambros felt dizzy and sweat-soaked and sarcastic. Blood stained parts of his clothing and boots, though not his armor: ‘These scales shed gore; nothing much sticks to that alloy...’ He shut down the machine and got to his feet, swearing in American. His visor lit up, with a message saying that the debriefing for the entire operation would be delayed for half a dekamera.
“Yeah, I bet,” he said, as he oriented himself: “I better help herd the refugees...” He worked the hatch and climbed down from the wing.
Combat Medical teams came dashing out of the elevators and spread out across the floor, dealing with wounded refugees and injured Hellenes as they came across them. Ambros waved the Meds away: “I’m unhurt. See to the Africans.”
At this point the refugees were doubly—or triply—traumatized: by war; by the treachery of their own commanders; and not least by their sudden Saltation into an entirely foreign environment. They suffered from the dizziness that Hellenic Warriors took for granted; they started and twitched at every sound that echoed through the warehouse-sized launch room. More than one had evacuated their bowels as they’d landed in Hellas...or even earlier.
Ambros stood guard with his rifle low front, worried about them, fearing that one or more might still be armed: ‘I can’t blame them for being freaked, but I don’t want to risk one of them breaking bad...’
One by one the Africans got first aid, food and drink, and reassurance. The Meds loaded few of them onto their force-field gurneys and pulled them onto the elevators; one they Saltated directly to Combat Medical.
A squad of armed and armored Red Warrior Skolarae came out of the elevators; Gennasi handsigned to Ambros, telling him he was relieved. He nodded and set the safeties on his weapons.
“I need a shower,” he said. He paced slowly for the bank of elevators, shaking his head at the madness of humans at war.
“No rest for the wicked,” Ambros frowned, as he armored down from the ‘real’ stuff, and stretched and limbered his tired shoulders and hips.
He donned a clean brick-red jumpsuit, faded to a peculiar brownish-pink. ‘That’s a sign of someone who spends a lot of time in his training-and-fighting gear,’ he thought. His was as faded as if he’d been a trainee and teacher for years, rather than months. He contemplated the intensity of his training, then stood up: ‘That’s on me. My Obligation. My choice.’ He wrapped his belt around his waist and left the room.
An hour later Ambros sat drinking tea in his favorite underground café in the Command Complex.
‘Tea’ he mused: ‘Just tea, since I’m teaching this afternoon.’ He wished a little for something stronger, and knew it for an urge to avoid processing his recent experiences.
‘Well, but that’s reasonable,’ he thought: ‘It’s just not feasible at the moment.’
Behind him he could hear two people talking: ‘Road Guild members,’ he silently concluded: ‘They’re arguing about routes for extending sewer lines into the areas adjacent to the City...’
“I don’t think we should extend the sewers to the north of the City,” the woman said: “That would encourage irresponsible intrusions into farmland.”
“But you agree that the area within the Long Walls is developable.”
“Yes, let us agree on that, and not argue publicly about the other...’
“But...”
Ambros tuned the conversation out.
Gennasi slogged into the café, looking much the worse for wear. She had clearly showered and wore a clean black tunic, red trousers, and harness boots—the kind manufactured in huge quantities by Apprentice Leatherworkers.
She looked right at him, then started, recognizing hm. She walked across the room, head hanging, and sat beside him. They stared together at the door, as though waiting for someone.
Ambros glanced sideways at her: “You ought to be asleep,” he said, eyes narrowed.
Her face looked old, her shoulders slumped. Dark patches below gave her eyes a haunted look. She said: “Can’t sleep yet. That was the worst fuck-up...”
He nodded: “That doesn’t happen to you all very often, huh?”
“I don’t recall...ever.”
They sat silently for a while. Then Ambros said: “You started out with a noble idea...that you could do a mercy for the combatants, and for adjacent civilans, by separating them...” He paused for a long moment.
Then he said: “There’s an old joke...how good is your American?”
“Not great.”
“You ever hear ‘lightbulb jokes’?”
“A few...we don’t actually use ‘light bulbs’ here in the Commonwealth...but I get the idea.”
“Endaxi. Here’s one, mostly translated into Hellenic: ‘How many psycho-physicists does it take to change a lightpanel?’ ”
She shook her head: “No idea.”
“Only one, but the lightpanel has to want to change.”
After a moment he said: “Doesn’t translate very well...”
“No, I get it. If our lightpanels were sentient, that would lead to complications.”
“Complications. That’s one way to describe it.” Ambros felt near tears.
“Here’s one,” she said: “A complication, I mean: disappearing casualties.”
“Yeah, Arrenji was telling me.”
“Hmm. Considering the number of dead on all three sides of that disaster, there are nowhere near enough bodies rotting in the plains and jungles of the Republique Centralafrique...in two Timelines.“
Ambros sat nodding: “Yeah. And I have a bad feeling about that. ‘Everybody’s gotta be somewhere’, as they say, and those bodies gotta be somewhere, too.”
“I’m sorry.” She sounded sincere.
“Accepted. But next time...”
She looked at him then, her eyebrows arched upward: “...next time?”
He sighed: “Next time you plan an intervention in a US Timeline, get me in on the ground floor, endaxi? I could have...”
“Got it,” she interrupted: “...and I will.”
Ambros’ MPS pinged him.
“I have to go, I’m teaching in half an hour...”
It took only a few minutes to negotiate the halls and elevators into the Main Hall of the Command Complex. He spoke to the Skolari at the street door: “I left my Shifter in my locker...”
“Kala, endaxi,” she replied: “Kalamerosas, Spathos.”
“Ki esi.”
He continued to roll his shoulders, seeking a level of relaxation consistent with teaching Archarae how to wield a reedsword. He felt himself getting there: ‘Loose enough to not get hurt, anyway. Although...walking away from that mess I was just in, nothing on this field is really dangerous by comparison. Still, I need be relaxed if I want to teach relaxation.’
Having come almost directly from actual combat into a teaching environment increased his concentration: ‘These students might be stuck in such a spot at some point in their lifetimes,’ he mused.
His usual practice kit took up his attention for a few minutes. Magistri Anni arrived and laid some books and a couple lapscrolls on the table inside the shelter.
Jimmy arrived and started to armor up. Ambros sat by the practice field, getting his thoughts in order. He glanced at Jimmy and saw that he was nearly armored.
Ambros stood up and walked onto the field, sword in left hand, above his head. When Jimmy joined him, Ambros said: “You learned anything lately, Archaros?”
Jimmy shrugged: “Couple things.”
“Try ’em out on me. Full speed.” Ambros saluted, entering ‘Posta de Donna’ from Fiore, his hands on the hilts near his right ear, sword point straight up.
Jimmy began to circle him. Ambros refused the bait, turning in place rather than counter-circling. Jimmy dropped to his right knee, moving forward, and stuck Ambros on his left shin.
He winced. ‘Jimmy knows I was injured.’
Ambros’ struck in response, driving his reedsword downleft and hitting Jimmy at the junction of neck and shoulder. The blow was hard enough to knock Jimmy down; as soon as his opponent lay prone, Ambros stuck the tip of his sword under the back edge of Jimmy’s helm.
It reminded him of one of his first kills with an APS: in the outpost raid, when he’d only minutes before joined the Commonwealth cause. He winced, recalling the smell of burning brains. It made him queasy. He growled at Jimmy:
“If these were Plasma Swords, you would be so dead right now...”
“So what? They aren’t real, they’re made of river reeds. I thought that move looked really cool.”
Ambros stepped back and gestured for Jimmy to rise: “C’mon. Try to think through what you’re doing a bit more, okay, vato? Sure this is fun, like any kind of exercise worth doing...and silly stuff like that last trick you tried is amusing. But...”
“But?”
Ambros shrugged: “We’ve been over this. You are training for a serious conflict. The bad guys in the war we’re in are total assholes. I had to cut my own damn foot off, and that fight was just with Posse Comitatus, a bunch of minor leaguers by contrast....”
“What should I be doing? Besides learning to kill bad guys?”
Ambros shook his head: “Learn a little defense, nitwit. Figure out what ‘Neutral’ means when applied to swordplay. Be ready for your attack to fail, and intercept any riposte coming your way.”
“My attacks don’t fail, except on you and Magistri Anni!”
“Yeah well...”
“Well what?”
Ambros lost his temper, briefly, thinking of the blood on his hands: “For fuck’s sake, idiot...Anni is the minimum level of skill you’ll find on a battlefield out in the Multiverse!” He calmed himself: “She has a neuro-muscular condition that keeps her out of combat, that’s why she teaches here. If you can’t beat her, say 19 out of twenty...”
“What?”
“You’ll die, that’s all. Eventually. Or worse, get captured.”
“Captured is worse than dead?” Jimmy shook his head.
“Would you like to be back in Cañada Prison?”
Jimmy frowned: “Not at all.”
“L’Iriquois’ inquisitors have much higher-tech ways of causing pain. Things that will never put you out of your misery by accident. And it’s a lot harder for the War Guilds to spring a prisoner from their custody. Get up.”
Jimmy did. Ambros thought he got up with more alacrity than usual.
Ambros crossed his sword with Jimmy’s: “This position is called crosáre by Fiore; we’re crossed, see? From this position, either of us can reach the other with minimum forward movement, or even by leaning a little...but not so much that you’re off-balance!”
Ambros demonstrated. “You need to learn how to eyeball this distance, so you can always cut when this close or closer...” Ambros executed a rapid slide step and smacked Jimmy in the ribs. He stepped back: “First distance is one quick step to the fight...” He took a long step to the left diagonal and smacked his sword across Jimmy’s grill: “Never wait while at First Distance or closer: strike, or step away! If you step in and strike, either evade your opponent’s attack or strike to cover! Your life will depend on it!”
Ambros continued the lesson, adding the other Archare in as they arrived: “If your opponent is taller or has a longer sword, se is automatically a step closer to the fight than you are. Learn to control distance, and you’ll control time. Learn to control time, and you’ll control distance. They are aspects of the same phenomenon.”
When all his regular students had arrived, he paused the lesson: “I’m going to be unusually hard on you beginners today. Feel free to drop out if this gets too nasty. But I’m fresh from a real battlefield and not in the mood to coddle anyone.”
It occurred to him to try an experiment: he recalled Arrenji speaking about gravity during his recent lesson from her.
“Remember,” he said, catching each student’s eye: “The ruling principle in all of the martial arts is Gravity.”
He let that sink in for a short time, then resumed the class.
He worked the Archarae mercilessly, straight through the usual rest break, emphasizing the lessons with occasional harder-than-usual smacks to helms or armor. Several showed signs of distress. None of them quit.
Each time he hit hard, he said: “Dead. You would be dead.”
When the bells rang over the City for the fifth hour, he released them. Some of them staggered as they went to the racks to disarm. One young Archaros wept openly, shaking as he cleaned and racked his gear. Anni walked over to comfort him, nodding slightly at Ambros as she went.
‘She gets it,” he thought: ‘Once in a while, a sword teacher has to get nasty with ser students...’
Jimmy walked over to him, helm off, a pondering look on his face.
“What do you think?” Jimmy asked. He sweated and gasped, having worked harder in full armor than Ambros had yet seen him do.
Ambros said: “Better.”
“That’s it? Just...better?”
“Yes. Better. I saw some improvement. You actually defended yourself, instead of just attacking all-out. That’s good. You might survive a limited engagement, which is not something I’d have said about you earlier today.”
Jimmy nodded: “Okay, good to know. I wanted to tell you...”
Ambros raised an eyebrow.
“I’ve been thinking. All the stuff you’ve told me, all the things Kim has been trying to tell me...I guess, I want you to know that I’m getting it. You getting mad at me, today...that helped.”
“That’s good.” Ambros schooled himself to be non-committal: ‘If he’s really turning, I don’t want him to see my doubts. If he’s bullshitting again, I don’t want to seem gullible.’
“I know you probably...I mean, the whole family, including Randy...and Marissa. You’re all going to want to see me live this new thing, not hear me talk about it.”
“That’s very astute.”
Jimmy nodded again: “And I expect I’m still gonna have a little jealousy if—when—Kim takes on new lovers. I just won’t let it show...until that jealousy really does go away. Kim says it will...go away, y’know?”
“Maybe,” Ambros replied: “If you stop feeding it, it probably will go away.”
Jimmy frowned, then he grinned: “You may be right. I hope so!”
“Time for me to hit the Baths,” Ambros said: “You oughtta work on that backside spin-and-parry...”
Jimmy shook his head; “No, I need to get to the Temple of Asklepios...”
“Oh shit,” said Ambros: “Is Kim due today?”
“She was duetwo weeks ago. She was starting labor—at last—when I headed for this class...wouldn’t let me stay, said I had my work to do while she did hers. I wanna be there for the birth, though...”
“Yeah, we’d best get going...”
Ambros sat in a chair in the corner of the delivery room. Kim reclined on her back, a baby girl between her breasts. Jimmy sat on the other side of the bed, where Ambros could see his face.
‘He looks overwhelmed. And well he may be. He has evidence of what he has to lose right in front of him, now. Maybe that will finish his turnaround.’
The baby waved her arms and squeaked. Kim woke up. She and Jimmy looked at each other, awed and amazed.
Ambros smiled nostalgically. He rose in silence and slipped out the door, leaving the new parents to the sudden weight of love and responsibility.
He felt the weight himself: ‘Today I went from a battlefield, all death and tragedy to teaching people how to perhaps not be casualties in such a fight—someday—to watching a baby being born. That’s heavy shit for a single day in early December...’
A week before Christmas, and Ambros had caught the women at Rose House:
“I have some decisions to make,” he said. He laid some documents out on the dining room table: “And I would appreciate your advice.”
Marie leaned over his shoulder and checked them out: “Oh my,” she said, impressed.
“Indeed,” said Luisa.
Kim grinned at them. She picked up one of the documents: “This is parchment...” Then she said: “That one is handmade paper purchased in Italy, and I bet it’s from Aunt Clem.
“You’re right in one guess,” said Ambros: “If it was a guess.”
“It wasn’t really. Aunt Clem spent a lot of time in Europe in the late forties...she did yeoman’s work for various relief agencies. Most people figured she was actually looking for her husband and kids; really she just wanted to help other people’s kids, mostly orphans.”
“Hmmm.” Ambros nodded, adding that to the things he knew about Clementine.
“She bought the paper then, and the matching envelopes. She still has reams of it.”
Marie picked up the parchment: “I can’t read this one, it’s not Rational Hellenic.”
“It’s the language called ‘The Oldest Language’ by Hellenes,” said Kim: “The language of Homer and Helen. And I can’t read it, either.”
“Well, neither can I,” said Ambros: “Except very roughly. I ran it through a translator program at the Library in Athino.”
“All right, what does it say?”
“It’s a very complex and ornate poem inviting me to participate in the Thaskaliad.”
“The teacher’s orgy!” Kim exclaimed.
“Yes, exactly.”
The baby fussed and Kim checked her diaper: “Go ahead, I’ll just take care of this while you talk.”
“Anyway,” said Ambros: “I’m invited to the Thaskaliad. It says nothing about the rest of you.
He picked up the envelope from Aunt Clem: “This invites our whole family, including Jimmy and Randy, to visit Clem and Eleanor at “Pyrgo Nickolaena”—Castle Nicholas, I guess you’d say—in late February.”
The baby was clean and dry but still fussing, so Kim put her to nurse: “I expected that invitation. She sent it to you, huh?”
“Yes,” said Ambros: “Handed it to me, actually, at Plataeo Sokratasena in Athino.”
“Ha!” Kim said. Then: “The black envelope...I don’t recognize that.”
“That is from Magistros Megálos, BWG and Sacred Band, inviting me to a service at the temple he runs.”
“He’s a priest?” Luisa seemed surprised.
“High priest of the Cult of Arrisini in Athens.” Ambros grinned: “It’s a mystery cult, so don’t ask. I haven’t the foggiest idea what they believe. Well, other than...”
“Other than?” Kim asked, irritated.
He laughed: “Mystery Cults in the Commonwealth commonly worship a female, male, and neuter Deity, in a kind of pseudo Trinity. But they only name the female...in public anyway.”
“Do they think to recruit you for their...religion? That seems very head-dead.” Luisa said, puzzled.
Ambros shrugged: “He says in the invite that there are no strings attached. It’ll only be in an initiates’ ceremony, so the great mysteries will not be broached. I mean, everyone in Athino knows that they venerate Arrisini, the woman whose disappearance led to the discovery of the Timeline Gates. Beyond that, though...” He let that trail off, enigmatically.
“Let’s do the easy one first,” said Kim: “We can all go to Greece in late February, right?”
After a little fiddling with their calendars, they each said yes.
“Three days, two nights,” said Marie: “None of us can afford more time on holiday right now.”
Ambros agreed.
“Will Jimmy be ready for a trip away from Athino by then?” asked Luisa.
“I would guess not, unless I agree to watch him pretty closely. I can do that...”
“Set it up, then, would you please?” said Kim.
He looked her in the eye, seeing her resolve: “I will,” he said: “And I’ll set it up for Randy to come along, too.”
“Good,” said Kim: “We do want to stay in Clem’s good graces, you know.”
“Yes,” said Ambros. “Yes, we do.”
“Now the Mystery Cult,” said Luisa: “I’d visit it in an instant, but I don’t know about you...”
Ambros waved the invite: “I could bring you. It says...” He saw the way she reacted. He continued: “We’ll go. Day after tomorrow, after I get back from Africa...”
She nodded happily: “I’ll be waiting for you outside the Temple.”
“Cool,” he said: “Here’s the tough one. I’m not sure...”
Marie interrupted him, teasingly: “Don’t want to risk a hundred or so Primary Skolo teachers’ lustful designs on your body?”
He laughed: “Not scared of that. Maybe I should be. But no, I...”
“Look,” said Kim: “We get it, we do. I for one am flattered that you feel uncertain of attending without us. But, you know...” She switched the baby to her other breast, and tipped her head toward her: ‘I’m kind of encumbered right now.”
Luisa said: “There’s no good reason not to go, unless you really don’t want to. You can’t make anyone pregnant, you can’t get an STI, and you would give and receive a great deal of pleasure there. I wouldn’t even want to go: that’s not my style. Marie?”
Marie said: “I’d maybe go...if I knew even a few of the teachers. But a masked ball, not knowing who I was fucking? That’s your kind of fun, though, right Ambros?”
“I’ve...had that kind of fun in the past...”
“Then go,” said Kim, firmly: “And don’t worry about us. I like that kind of fun, too, but with Adele...” She grinned: “I’ll want a full report, though!”
He laughed and said. “I’ll consider it.”
“You should go,” said Marie: “When the masks come off in the morning, you’ll have some new friends, new contacts in Athino.”
“People who are not Warriors,” said Luisa.
“Okay, that’s a good point,” he said: “I really will consider it.”
They all smiled at him, knowingly.
Ambros met Luisa on a back street near the Themistoclean Wall. The dingy buildings thereabouts made the scarlet and silver door of the Temple of Arrisini seem to glow. They approached.
“I wonder if we should knock,” said Luisa.
The door opened before they could. Megálos stood there, wearing a floor-length robe with a hood that left his face in shadow.
“Greetings,” the priest intoned. He bowed: “Enter, if you will...”
The anteroom, squat and dim, led to a hole in the wall, through which they squatted and crawled.
Inside, darkness covered them. Small flickering lights surrounded them, barely illuminating the pathway down. A musky incense filled the air.
Luisa sneezed.
Ambros put a hand on her arm and said: “Just a moment...” He pulled a small case out of his right patch pocket and produced a filmy, transparent rectangle, hardly to be seen in the dim light.
“This is a Commonwealth gas mask. Stops almost all particulates and most gasses.” He put it on, smoothing the top across his brow, and the sides along the edge of his beard: “It will bridge over your eyes and cling closely to your nose and mouth. It’s weird at first...”
He handed her another, and she put it on.
“Good?”
She nodded, sniffing. Megalos had vanished, so Luisa led the way down the subtly sloping pathway. The walls got wetter and they passed from brick to stone to walls carved out of the limestone bedrock. The ramp went on for a long time.
A door on their right swung open as they approached. Luisa entered first, seemingly eager to see the sanctuary.
As he followed, Ambros’ mouth opened wide in astonishment. The room stretched away from them, the nearest walls fading into darkness on either side. Paintings and framed photos of various landscapes hung upon the walls behind them, but they had no leisure to examine them.
People came out of the darkness all around, gathering near the center of the room. A light kindled there, far off, brighter than any they’d yet seen. Even with that illumination, they could not see the roof of the cavern.
Luisa spoke, softly: “It’s an altar!”
“It’s at least three hundred ells away,” Ambros whispered: “This cavern is huge!”
Luisa only nodded, awed.
The worshippers gathered around, but left an aisle so that Ambros and Luisa could see the ceremony. Neither of them felt like getting closer, not then.
Megálos appeared again, dressed now in shining mail, like fishes’ scales, glistening in multiple water and sky colors. He began a chant in the Oldest Language.
‘The language of Agamemnon and Odysseus,’ Ambros thought.
As Megálos chanted, four more large men appeared, joining him in the song. Their deep gruff voices filled the hall and echoes created a round-like effect, each phrase repeated back at various intervals. The sound grew thus, vibrating the very stone of the chamber, it seemed.
A clutch of teenagers appeared, all girls. One of them began a solo descant, her tiny voice amplified by the sophisticated structure of the hall. Soon the other girls joined in, not in harmony but in counterpoint. The sonic effects became overwhelming, shaking Ambros to his core. He felt the mystery of the Multiverse in his heart and gut and genitals, and the hair on his neck stood out like spines.
Luisa’s eyes closed and she shuddered, leaning against him.
The deaths he’d had a hand in over the course of the last month or so intruded upon his consciousness. The darkness of the room oppressed him, and the deep voices of the men vibrated in his chest, threatening to bring him to tears. The weight of his deeds seemed to lift from his shoulders and from his soul. He felt ‘one with everything’ again, briefly and slightly: ‘Ever so slightly, compared with then...’
He drew a deep breath and considered what it meant that he’d had such a satori in a religious space: ‘But that’s the point of such a place, isn’t it?’
A tiny girl, perhaps ten years old, came from behind them and took their hands. She led them along the aisle, past silent, hooded worshippers, all with their heads bowed and their hands above their heads in the ancient attitude of prayer.
As they approached, the songs ended. The echoes lasted for minutes afterwards.
When the room had again become silent, Megálos stepped to the altar. He spoke in a normal tone of voice, amplified again by the limestone walls of the cave:
“Hear me friends! This is the ceremony of the First Mystery of Holy Arrisini!”
Megálos spoke this phrase in the Oldest Language; the girl holding their hands repeated it quietly in Rational Hellenic.
The Kopeli who’d been first to sing spoke then, in Rational Hellenic: “There are strangers present.”
“Yes,” said Megálos.
“Are they Seekers?”
“Time will tell.”
“Well said,” the teen replied: “Who objects to strangers in the Hall of Mystery?”
Silence held for moments, then she said:
“Let the First Mystery be told.”
Another light came on, illuminating the area behind the altar. A young woman in a mask appeared, a corgi-ish dog beside her. Together they danced the tale of Arrisini’s disappearance while Megálos narrated and the girl translated:
“She and her dog went walkabout in the hills.
She walked here and there,
Exploring.
She sought nothing but found everything
At this the woman walked into the darkness. Others danced with the dog then, searching the edges of the darkness. Ambros found himself impressed by the dog’s skill as a dancer: ‘In other circumstances, this might seem like a charade...these folks are dead serious, though.’
Megálos’ chant continued:
Her dog came back but she did not.
Her loved ones searched;
They found Her not.
Her dog led the way.
Her brother found the Gate,
But no one found Her.
Does She ride the Gates through the Multiverse?
Did She die or is She here?
Let Her be Here, if so She wishes.
Let Her be Here!
Megálos roared the last line at the top of his lungs.
While the echoes of that roar filled room, the other dancers left the scene, and the masked woman reappeared. She stood silent, swaying as if drunk or tripping.
“Where are you, Holy Arrisini?” Megálos intoned, facing the worshippers.
The dancer answered: “No one knows. I am everywhere, nowhere, long gone and always present. I am Holy Arrisini, with you now but soon lost yet again.”
A long pause followed, as people moved about and swapped places. Then Megálos droned in the Oldest Language for a few minutes.
He spoke again in Rational Hellenic: “The time has come for the Second Mystery of Holy Arrisini...”
A girl on the verge of puberty appeared and took Ambros and Luisa by their hands.
Megálos said: “Now our guests must choose: to join in the Second Mystery, and take the Vow of Silence on whatsoever they may see or hear in this fane, or to leave us now...”
“We...I’ll leave now,” said Ambros
“I will stay,” said Luisa.
Ambros gave her a confused glance. She stared seriously at him.
“I want to know more about this Cult,” she said.
He drew a deep breath and said: “As you wish.”
The girl led Luisa forward for a few steps, then urged her to the front, saying: “Go and take your oath.”
Then she returned and took Ambros’ hand. She raised her other hand and great clouds of smoke rose from around the crowd, slowly covering them and removing them from his sight. His last glimpse showed Luisa taking a knee before the masked woman, their hands gripped tight to one another.
The girl led him away, round several turns and twists. They did not pass through the narrow tunnel near the front of the Temple. Instead, she tugged at his hand, leading him on a long, slowly rising track, limestone walls upon all sides.
“Close your eyes,” she whispered.
He did; and light grew about him, dazzling his retinas even through his eyelids.
“Wait,” she said. Then: “Now you may open your eyes.”
They stood in an alley, the Library of Athens visible at the end of it. She drew him down and kissed him on the mouth, lightly. She said: “Go with good fortune and be well.”
She turned and re-entered the tunnel. He heard the door latch behind him, and a bolt slide home.
He rubbed his mouth, frowning: “What was that kiss about? Part of the ritual?”
He decided it must have been so. He shrugged and walked toward the Library, thinking: ‘I have an errand there anyway, I might just as well get that done...’
His thoughts remained with the ritual he’d just witnessed: ‘I know a bit more now; and it figures that the mysterious disappearance of Arrisini would spawn a mysterious cult. They seem to have made her a combination sacrificial lamb and oracle...and it was her disappearance that led directly to the discovery of the Timeline Gates. Most of Commonwealth technology grew out of the study of the Gates.’
He passed into the Library’s silent foyer, nodding to people who signed greetings to him. He made short work of his errand, then went through the halls and rooms to his own research station in the margins of the Military wing.
He asked his tech for anything it could give him on the Cult of Arrisini.
“Huh,” he said. He followed links and asked other questions, but got no more than a detailed description of what he had just seen in the Temple. One link demanded a password; he realized that that was the link that would tell him something he didn’t already know, and he couldn’t access it.
“Well, it’s supposed to be a secret, after all,” he grinned: “I got exactly one factoid that is news to me. The dancing dog is a direct descendant of Arrisini’s pet. Which tells me that the Cult got started soon after her disappearance...very interesting.”
Ambros slowly came back to full consciousness. He reclined on his back, staring at the sky; a few stars still shone out, but the light blue sky of first light slowly washed them away. He drew a deep breath, feeling surprisingly chipper.
The hard stone beneath him revealed his location: ‘I’m on the Akropolis...’ The mask hanging round his neck told him why.
He looked around.
The Thaskaliae and their other guests mostly still slept, cast on the ground wherever exhaustion had seized them. Someone had gone around and laid blankets over each person or pair or triad, though Ambros had no idea which of the revelers had been straight enough to do such a thing.
‘Sure wasn’t me...’ he mused.
Thaskali Saphronisi sat up nearby, her mask falling away as she did. She stretched her arms over her head and yawned.
He rolled over and staggered to his feet. He looked around for his clothes: ‘Where was I when I disrobed?’ he asked himself.
Saphronisi grabbed her blanket and wrapped it round herself, as though suddenly modest. She smiled at him, though, rather wickedly.
He had a clear memory of very wild copulation with her; she’d been like a madwoman; he’d been acting damn crazy himself. He wrapped his own blanket around his waist. He recalled a suprisong number of incidents from the orgy: ‘...all of them, I think. So no matter how high I was, memory loss does not seem to be a side effect of that drug.’ I might be embarrassed by some of what I did, except no one here was notinvolved in the same sort of things...’
The wind kicked up. A bit of rain fell, chill rain that stung his face.
Saphronisi shuddered, then stood up: “It’s the Winter Solstice, after all. We should expect cold rain.”
“Didn’t seem to bother anyone last night,” said Ambros, smiling crookedly.
“Well, with amnektaro in one’s system, nothing except...pleasure...is likely to get your attention.”
“Yeah,” he said: “Exactly what is that stuff, anyway?”
“Eenay mystiko thaskala,” she said: “The food and drink of the Gods.”
“Indeed. And I have nothing like a hangover.”
“Of course not.” She pointed at the corner of the Parthenon: “I think we undressed each other over there...once we used wine to dilute the drug, but we found that it had fewer side effects when taken neat. And no hangovers. Most of us will need a nap later, of course...”
“Of course...”
They went to the spot she’d indicated. His shirt lay there, shredded. His trousers were fine, though. She put her dress on, turning away first.
He also dressed. By then the rain had wakened most of the revelers. Everyone’s masks were off. He recognized several people from the night’s pleasures, mostly by the way they moved or by their voices. Knowing smiles passed between them. RNA memory told him that he should regard them all as acquaintances now, greet them in the streets, ask their names then, and get to know them when convenient.
With everyone unmasked and clothed, it was harder to know who had done what the night before: distinguishing characteristics covered up, and even people’s genders somewhat less clear. He pondered that, wondering who among them looked at him, wondering. The Thaskaliae gathered everyone into a hands-holding circle and one old woman spoke a few words in the Oldest Language.
Ambros didn’t trouble to try to fully translate that: something about Athena and Holy Celibacy, which made little sense in light of the orgy he’d just participated in. RNA memories tried to impinge upon him, stuff about an old religious sect that no longer carried much weight even with the Thaskaliae. ‘Fossilized Rituals,’ it began. He suppressed the memory prompt: he had other things to think about.
Even as they broke their circle, his MPS pinged him: ‘Yeah, I know I have stuff to do,’ he thought: ‘I’ll get started after I shower and change clothes.’ He entered the Parthenon and left his mask on the altar, as was the custom. Soon he was descending the stairs from the Akropolis to the Peripeteo.
He shivered a bit as he negotiated the streets to the Command Complex. His ragged shirt and trousers and boots were little protection from cold drizzle. The blanket gave some inadequate comfort.
His Shifter back in his pocket, he crossed the echoing Great Hall, ignoring the debate occurring around the stage to one side. He felt himself tensing up, noticeable because of the level of relaxation he’d been feeling not long before. He rolled his shoulders as he contemplated his next task.
He showered and dressed in clean trousers and shirt. He sat on the bench in front of his locker for a while, thinking hard, but not trying to relax: ‘Trying is the wrong way to get to true relaxation,’ he thought: ‘Let your body return to its natural state, relaxation. Calm mind and relaxed body. Right.’
He wrapped a cloak around himself and headed for his next rendezvous.
He rested comfortably in an odd-looking chair. He cradled a teacup. He smelled the floral scent of the tea as steam wafted from it. Eleanor bustled about the room, putting books back on shelves.
They were in the Library in Clem and Ellie’s rather spacious apartment in the Orenhauser mansion south of Eugene.
Clementine sat across from him with a photo album in her lap, tears in her eyes of nostalgia and regret.
She looked up at him: “Mr Rothakis...Ambros...I look at these pictures and I am overwhelmed by sadness. Yet they were taken in such happy times!”
“At a time when Master Nikodemos was being Nicholas Crowell, I guess.” Ambros had no truly fond memories of the crotchety old man, as he’d known him.
“Yes, and we were young and so in love. Well...I was young, Nicholas as it turned out was even older than he appeared to be.”
“That didn’t matter,” said Eleanor, peering at a spine and finding the book’s place on the shelves: “If not for the war, and the chaos it engendered, perhaps we could all have stayed together. But that moment passed...such wonderful things we might have done if the three of us could have stayed together.”
Ambros lifted an eyebrow. He sipped tea.
Clementine positively gushed: “You see, we had such plans! Nicholas had no end of money he could have accessed; we could have encouraged so much growth and reform, and perhaps turned this Timeline in a much more sustainable direction.”
Eleanor frowned: “Now, the Line is rapidly approaching disaster, even if no invasion comes from the Authoritarian Timelines.” She watched Ambros carefully as she said that.
He returned her gaze: “So you know about the likely greater disaster looming over the Multiverse...”
“Arrenji briefed us,” said Clementine.
“We understand your project,” said Eleanor: “We ‘get’ what you are going to try to do: fight off an invasion, and in the chaos of that fight, begin a revolution both social and ecological...”
Clementine said: “We realize now that such violence is inevitable. Even if not triggered by an oncoming invasion, great and terrifying changes in how we live and cooperate in this Timeline mustcome to pass.”
Eleanor smiled sadly: “We understand that now, at this late date, with the world in such straits, that we must rely upon soldiers such as yourself to salvage what can be saved. We realize that many people will die, and others suffer great loss. But no other path forward reveals itself to us.”
“I see,” said Ambros: "But you are under a bit of a misapprehension about my role.”
“How so?” Eleanor asked.
“Well...I'm not a soldier, you see? I am a trained fighter, a Warrior, working as a Sacred Band operative, so I'm a spy and an agitator. And I am a radio, and a loudspeaker. I cry out a warning to all who will listen, preparing them to act when the disaster strikes...and I whisper in selected ears, urging people who already somewhat agree with me to redouble their preparations.
“Also, in combat I would be a Commando or Guerrilla; more or less the opposite of a soldier...Red Warrior Guild are the soldiers."
Clementine nodded: “Yes, we understand. We had a taste of that sort of action, back in 1940...”
Kim came swirling into the room, her dress all translucent blue silk, in dozens of layers. Ambros stopped still for a moment, stunned by the beauty. She spun around, then grabbed at the back of a chair.
He was beside her in an instant: “You okay?”
“Yes,” she said, annoyed: “I gave birth a month ago, you’d think I’d be fully recovered by now. My sense of balance is still totally off.”
Clementine laughed: “You may soon be less dizzy, but you will never really recover. A child changes everything for you.”
“Oh, I’m getting that impression,” Kim said, smiling.
She went over to the couch where Adele was sleeping, surrounded by pillows and bolsters: “Let’s see if I can get you up without
waking you...”
She accomplished the deed, and turned to the women: “You ladies ready?”
“We are,” said Clementine: “Is Ambros Shifting us?”
“No, I’m calling Ke’akani for a ride,” said Kim, touching her wrist: “Ambros has to get dressed, then bring Randy to Athino via the War Room. Get close to me, you two.”
They embraced her, and she threw a kiss at Ambros, then said: “Ready, Magistri!”
The four of them vanished with a bang.
‘I gotta get back to my Salon and change. Another Solstice, another New Year’s ceremony in Athino...as time goes by.’
He drew out his Shifter and Jumped.
